


Time is No Healer

by Hattingmad



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: F/M, Multi, Other, Pretentious, Time Travel Fix-It
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2021-02-22
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:41:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28178547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hattingmad/pseuds/Hattingmad
Summary: What would you give to change your fate?"Not my fate. But others. Those who suffered for my choices born of ignorance. For them? Anything. Everything."
Relationships: Ascian Characters/Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Solus zos Galvus | Emet-Selch/Warrior of Light
Comments: 27
Kudos: 88





	1. Chapter 1

and the way _up_ is the way **down**

the way forward is the way ~~back~~ ,

you cannot face it steadily but this thing is sure,

that time is _no_ healer: the patient is no longer here.-ts eliot

~~%~@

There is a voice.

A voice in her head.

Not hers, not Fray's, not Ardbert's or even Hydaelyn's.

A voice that echoes, a voice that leaves the tang of metal in her mouth. 

Alexander's?

The mechanical primal?

Matoya had asked her to mop things up while she was in the neighborhood, in between 'incessantly bothering' her and demanding she return to her 'moldy old hole', and so here she was, typical Warrior of Light, bashing Illuminati skulls and being sucked into the bowels of a steam-powered giant.

Not exactly _uncommon,_ all things considered, but even so, she wasn't expecting it to _talk._ Not coherently, anyway.

Most primals didn't use their questionable vocal chords for more than posturing and threats--Hydaelyn excepted, of course.

No, the Mother Crystal never shut _up,_ broadcasting her message constantly to all who might listen.

A universe-spanning spam letter.

_Hear. Feel. Think._

_Hear. Feel. Think._

Unending.

And even now, after everything, her fellow Scions worry _only_ that Zodiark is a primal, conveniently forgetting (or uncaring) that their precious star had been shattered by the force of them _both,_ by the conflict between umbral and astral, chaos and stagnation.

And nothing she says do they hear.

So be it, then.

If they will not help her rid the world of manmade gods, _all_ the gods, then...

What has it all been _for?_

So much blood stains her hands, so much history, snuffed out permanently by her power, by Her Light. Her pet Warrior.

And too late, far too late, did she finally learn the truth.

_~Your mind dwells upon the past, Bringer of Light.~_

Ah. Yes. She has become distracted from her current task.

"Don't call me that."

_~Whyever not? It is your title, is it not? Bestowed by your Mother?~_

"I'm... I can't be that person anymore."

_~Yet you fight, do you not? Even now?~_

"It's... it's too late to do anything else."

_~Then, what would you give to change your fate?~_

"Not my fate."

_~No? Your soul cries out with anguish, yet you desire no change?~_

"Not for me. But... others. Those who suffered for my choices, when I was blind. Ignorant. For them? Anything. No. _Everything_."

_~Many have desired my power for themselves, for good or ill. But you...~_

The belly of the beast heats and steams, and the Warrior begins to think she will simply be cooked, boiled alive. Then Alexander speaks once more.

_~I would wish you luck, for you shall need it...but then, you have always made your own luck, have you not, little Wanderer? Fare thee well.~_

"Wait, what-?"

* * *

She falls forever.

Or only for a second.

She can't say for sure. 

She coalesces. Checks herself over for internal bleeding or dire injury. Yes, everything seems to be intact. She opens her eyes.

What.

The Fuck.

She's standing on a road outside the Waking Sands. 

And standing across from her is an Ascian.

Specifically, Elidibus.

Who is dead.

Dead, like Lahabrea.

Like Emet-Selch.

And the dead man speaks.

"Have the laws of man grown so twisted in my absence that it is now permitted to lay hands upon an emissary?"

Wait.

She remembers this.

He had tested her, had sent others along the road, and then...

This is their first meeting, is it not?

And if that is so, then...

He lives. They _all_ yet live.

Alexander.

He must have sent her back.

But why? How?

Does it matter?

Does it matter, when she can save them? Save them all?

"Emissary Elidibus," she begins, and though it takes her a moment, she prides herself on the steadiness of her voice, betraying little of her shock. "Forgive me. I merely anticipated...a possible further test. You are, of course, entirely correct."

She stores her weapon, showing him her empty palms.

"I believe you when you say that you come in peace. The same, I fear, cannot be said of all my compatriots. Might there be a more private venue for a discussion of how we could come to a mutually beneficial agreement?"

The Emissary is silent behind his mask. Thinking, perhaps. Studying her. Surely not trusting her. How could he? His memories are so fragmented, and he has not the power of Emet-Selch, to view her soul. He does not know who they were to each other.

But he will.

She will not waste, must not waste, this most precious gift of time.

"I will surrender my weapons, if you will promise likewise not to alter me irreparably with your formidable magics."

So saying, she extends her grimoire to him, an offering. A gift.

He stares at the book. Carefully, he retrieves it with claw-tipped gloves, and stores it within the folds of his robe. Disarming her seems to convince the Emissary of her sincerity, enough, at least, that he opens the now all-too-familiar violet rift in space.

"I give you my word that no harm will come to you, should you choose to-"

Before he completes his sentence, she steps into the void, and he can do nothing but follow.


	2. Chapter 2

"I expected you to be somewhat reckless by nature," the Emissary says upon catching up to the Warrior, "but outright suicidal I did not anticipate. I could snuff your life out like the briefest of candles! To waltz into an enemy stronghold, unarmed, with only a verbal guarantee of safety from me, is--"

"But you won't harm me," the Warrior says, quiet but sure. "You don't exist to hurt, Elidibus. You exist to save."

He frowns slightly beneath his mask, lips pursing, but she speaks again before he can voice his question.

"Incidentally...whose seat have I taken?"

She stands on a large stone platform in the shape of a seat, one of many, one close to the icon of Zodiark, the spell having deposited her in this seat of Ascian power in this liminal space upon arrival.

_Where the reconvened Convocation sits, absent a member..._

_Was this always the seat of Azem? Did Hades keep it for me?_

She's touched, if so.

"You haven't. It is empty."

"How strange, to keep a seat without an occupant. Has it always been thus?"

The white-robed Ascian looks down for a moment, shakes his head.

"You would have to ask another of our number. Lahabrea, perhaps, were you two on better terms."

Ah, yes, the fiery-tempered Speaker. Little wonder that he hates her current incarnation. He, like Elidibus, lacks the soul-sight that would tell them she is no enemy, nor will ever be.

"Ah. Tell me, does he still make horses?"

"What do you--"

"No, forgive me. It's nothing."

She lapses into silence, apologies for more than his confusion trapped on her tongue.

_I never should have left you all. You, especially. It was far too heavy a burden to place on your shoulders. I should have been there to stop it. Please. Forgive me._

Does he even recall her as Azem? Or have those memories been consumed by his eon-spanning duty? Have the other Unsundered ever spoken of her? Or was her defection too painful? She regrets so much, and here, more than anywhere else, she might speak freely, away from the Mother Crystal's ever-watchful gaze. But would he hear it?

No.

Not yet.

Not yet.

"I wish to warn you, if you will listen. The Scions of the Seventh Dawn are experimenting with a way to end your kind. White auracite, to trap and destroy your disembodied selves. Please...be careful."

"Why betray your comrades to offer me this information?" He demands, and his suspicion is more than evident.

She smiles, sadly.

"I see. I suppose it might look that way, to you. But, like you, I only wish to save those I hold dear."

She hesitates. It hurts, to interact with him, and him see her only as a stranger. But soon...

"May I ask a seemingly-random question?"

"It seems you already are, regardless of my wishes on the matter. But proceed. If this gift of information is true, I would settle my debt with you. I will not be beholden to a child of Hydaelyn."

She cannot deny it. Not here, and not to him. He will not understand, will not _remember--_

"Does Emperor Solus zos Galvus yet live?"

"I fail to understand the import of your inquiry, but, though ill, he remains upon this mortal coil."

_That early, then._

"Then I would entreat you...I seek an audience with him. Can you arrange it?"

Now he seems almost amused through his perplexity.

"So you seek peace with Garlemald as well as we Ascians? How ambitious. Still... it is within my power, and I have no reason to deny you. Will you require time to prepare?"

"A day, only. You have my gratitude, Emissary."

"Do not thank me until you have met the man. You may yet have cause to regret your request," he tells her, and she swears she detects another hint of bone-dry humor in it.

"I shall take that under advisement."

"Mm. I should return you, lest your companions send out a search party."

"Yes, very probably," she agrees, sighing, and takes his offered hand.

"Does this space not disturb your mortal sensibilities? I would think you glad to be quit of it."

"Perhaps it is you I shall sorrow to part from--or had that possibility not occurred to you?"

Ah. There it is. The subtle blush. He was ever easy to fluster.

"You make mock of me."

"Never," she vows, as he deposits her back in front of the Waking Sands. "Tease you, perhaps. But mock you? Never."

"Until the morrow."

He disappears in haste. Poor Elidibus. She is quite sure she has scrambled his brain. Still...

_Worth it._


	3. Chapter 3

She has only one task before her, before Elidibus comes to retrieve--er, escort--her to Garlemald.

That the number is singular does not mean it will be _easy,_ however.

Speaking to Urianger is an exercise in frustration at the best of times, and this is decidedly _not_ the best of times. But of all the Scions, he is the most likely to heed her, and the least likely to betray her confidences. She tells herself that, anyway, having bribed him to a meeting with tea and biscuits.

"I would have your counsel on my thoughts of late," she begins, gently blowing on her steaming cup, and through his hood and goggles, she can almost _feel_ his flinch. 

"Pray, excuse mine insouciance, and I mean no disrespect to thee by the asking, but...why dost thou seek _my_ counsel? Art there none amongst our number more...well suited to thy inquiry?"

"You strike me as a scholar well-versed in the metaphysical, is all, and a man who keeps your own counsel. But I will not force you to speak with me, should you find the notion distasteful."

"Nay, not distasteful! I simply meant...I..." He sighs and waves his hand in the vaguely embarrassed fashion common to Elezen she has come to _know--will_ come to know?--in Ishgard. "Prithee, forgive my offense and continue?"

"It's fine. Hm." She laughs, awkwardly. "Now that I have the floor, I struggle to find the right words. Perhaps... you are well-read, yes? Tell me. In your reading, have you ever come across a figure who at first seemed a villain...until you better understood their motivations? Or, to come at this another way, recent history tells us that the Garleans were an oppressed people, unable to use the magics that flow so freely through our veins, doomed to be crushed on all sides by their neighbors... until the discovery of ceruleum. Of magitek. Now, they are a conquering imperial force, and we consider them to be the oppressors. Yet, only a generation ago, the opposite would have held true. Are you with me so far?"

"I follow thy train of thought, yes."  
  
"I find myself contemplating...are we not the same? Will our deeds not be viewed in similar lights, someday? I have taken lives in pursuit of our noble goals, true, but--would those I have harmed not call me butcher? Kin-slayer? A terror and a threat? And would they not, from their perspective, be right to do so? I would be a peacemaker, not a blade only. I wonder, is that madness?"

"......If I understand aright, thou art concerned that through our efforts to save our Star from Calamity... we mayest yet be on the wrong side of history?"

"Mm, not exactly, but sort of? Master Louisoux gave his life that _all_ on this star might be saved. To honor his legacy, and his sacrifice, I, too, would do all I can. I would treat with our enemies, be they willing. Tempering is a tragedy that could befall any of us, after all. And...I have considered the nature of primals, of late. Every eikon ever summoned comes from our hopes and dreams and desperate prayers, all the gods wrought by our own hands. If there are no true gods, only mortal desires...I wonder what that says of the Mother Crystal. To that end, I wish to journey to Garlemald. In my absence, I would entrust you with this familiar, and ask that you research its properties, possible applications."

She produces the porxie and it snuffles gently at the folds of Urianger's cloak, giving an inquisitive snort to the scholar across the table.

"Perhaps others from the Circle might be of help. But this little one...I would give him to you. And should I return _changed_ in any way...I would have his healing arts used upon me."

"But this is too sudden! Wilt thou not take thy companions with thee? 'Tis not safe to journey alone!"

"I won't be alone. I've arranged for an escort. An emissary who comes in peace. But grateful I ever remain for your concern."

"There is no swaying thee from thy course?"

"No. It's... it's the right thing to do."

The Elezen sighs heavily and rubs at the sliver of forehead not hidden by his goggles.

"I worry for thee. Please, go safely."

She reaches across the table and touches his hand, startling him and bringing a red hue to his cheeks.

"I will. Thank you."

She can only pray that the meeting with the emperor goes half as smoothly. But if she knows Hades at all...

It won't.

It definitely, definitely won't.


	4. Chapter 4

It's too bloody cold in Garlemald, even under her heavy cloak. 

Elidibus, of course, doesn't seem to mind the chill, even in the imperial palace, all metal and gloom. She would have thought the magitek would give off more heat.

It's odd, to think of those she has yet to meet, still clanking around in here. Nero and his pissing contest with Cid. Zenos and his battle bustle. Regula. Varis, even, though their meeting had been stilted at best, before.

But it wasn't before. This is a different future.

She thinks she understands what made G'raha Tia behave so erratically, now, on the First. It's enough to make any man's head spin.

She feels a pang of sadness, of longing, for her friends and former companions, for all those whose lives she will no longer touch. Is she doing the right thing? Is she, really?

But then she thinks of the Convocation, who were her colleagues and friends before this world ever _existed_ , before Hydaelyn's blemish upon their star came to be. Those she wronged. Those she murdered. Lives of devotion, dedication to service, to righting these terrible wrongs...snuffed out, by _her_ bloody hand. Poor, half-crazed Lahabrea. Devious Nabriales. Devoted Mitron. Passionate Igeyorhm. Duty-bound Elidibus, who even now walks by her side. 

And the man she has come to see.

Emet-Selch, angel of truth. Architect. Unsundered. Beloved.

No.

She is resolved.

Her Mother's tempering will _not_ stop her.

Out of courtesy, she lingers outside the audience chamber while the Emissary makes his arrangements; a suspiciously-timed dismissal of the guard leaves her awkwardly shuffling near the door, and she feels a cold rush of terror sweep through her--it could all go horribly wrong here. What if he fails to recognize her? What if he takes her head for her insolence and this is all for naught? She has fought and killed _gods,_ and this reunion is what has her shaking in her boots.

Then the voice of Solus zos Galvus rings out, commanding, "enter".

But this is not the voice she recalls, not one she recognizes. It has weight and age; it is gravelly and rough. The emperor is ancient, for a mortal--almost ninety, if she remembers correctly. Surely, Emet will shed this form soon. She looks up at the man on the throne, a decrepit form swathed in imposing armor made for a much younger man. Even so, he is imposing.

"Come closer, child, and let me get a good look at you."

She approaches slowly, rabbit-heart in her throat, and chokes out,

"Thank you, your Eminence, for granting my audience. I had hoped that, in addition to treating with His Imperial Majesty, I might also speak with the Ascian, Emet-Selch, should he be...available."

"Elidibus? Explain yourself."

"I cannot, for it was not me who informed her. Perhaps Lahabrea mentioned you?"

"That imbecile," the emperor mutters, his sharp golden gaze glaring at all and sundry behind bushy brows. "Well? Do get on with it, I haven't got all day. What do you want?"

Right. This is it. All or nothing. She's run it through in her head so many times on the way here that she ought to be able to recite it in her sleep, yet when she goes to speak, she tastes salt on her tongue.

Oh.

She is crying. Already.

She scraps the speech. Instead, words are wrenched from the depths of her soul. Simple. Plain. Agonized. Raw. She goes to one knee before the throne.

"To undo what Venat wrought upon our star, so long ago. I cannot mend my failures alone, but with your help, my Hades, I yet may. To that end, I beg of you... your Traveler tires of her wandering. Please, let me come home."

And though she knows how lacking she is, compared to her former glory, still she reaches, wishing, hoping, praying, passing a hand over her face with trembling fingertips, and there-! for an instant, but enough, the red sigil washes over her vision, flaring to life, the symbol of her office. The sigil of Azem.

There is a dull thud as Elidibus falls to his knees beside her, turning her to face him, shaking her.

"How? How can this be? We lost you! We watched you die!"

The emperor, for his part, pierces her with his soul-sight, clutching at his chest as he wheezes,

"Azem? It...cannot be..."

And slumps over on his seat, ashen and unmoving.

She stares at Elidibus.

"Is he...?"

"I _told_ him holding onto a body this long would have unfortunate consequences, but the stubborn old fool refused to listen to my counsel." The Emissary sighs and clutches at his forehead with talon-tipped gloves. "What an utter _mess._ "

"Doesn't he have dozens of clone bodies stuffed in a closet somewhere, anyway?"

"Yes, but how did you-"

"I suppose you could say I've crossed oceans of time to find you once again," she offers with a shrug and a smile. "It's a bit of a long story. Why don't we go somewhere warm so I can tell it? Besides, we'd probably better go before the guards return and discover we've assassinated the Emperor of Garlemald."

Elidibus has a touch of mischief about him even as he offers her his hand to teleport away.

"Why, whatever do you mean, Azem? I was never here."

It takes her a moment to remember that, true enough, unblessed mortal eyes cannot see Ascians when not possessing a body, and as they vanish from the throne room, words echo in silent halls:  
"Son of a--!"


	5. Chapter 5

He sits on a beach near Costa del Sol, his bare feet dangling off the pier into the waters below. 

It is discomfiting, to be so exposed, and he makes small, abortive movements to tug his robes back down over his shins, but the Warrior--no, _Azem_ \--stares him down until he ceases his fidgeting.

He dislikes this; threads of memory tease at his senses, a dull pounding at his temples. Phantom voices, blurry faces, deep in the recesses of his mind. Has he been here before? Sitting here, like this, with Azem? It feels familiar. It...

There was wind, before, he thinks. Wind on his face, in his hair. Had he removed his mask, then? But he is Elidibus, he is duty, he would never--would he? _Had_ he?

Like a sleepwalker, or an automaton treading old grooves in the dirt, he reaches for his hood and slips it down to his shoulders, a tangle of moonlight-pale hair spilling free. Even he knows not why he does this; his Ascian form has no true material substance, these gestures are pointless, and only the woman beside him can see him at all, and yet the motion stirs something in him, scraps of knowledge he has had no reason to access in thousands of years bubbling up to the surface of his consciousness, and he speaks. Hesitantly, as though trying to confirm the veracity of what he says.

"You...liked to feed me. 'Delicacies', from your trips abroad, I think you said, smuggling them into the Convocation chamber in what was honestly a show of blatant favoritism, and-- You would braid my hair?"

He turns to look askance at her, behind his mask, only to see her rummaging within a saddlebag she has produced from seemingly nowhere, and _ah,_ he thinks, _spacial manipulation for storage purposes, yes, Azem came up with that,_ only mildly surprised that _this_ is a magic she has not lost, in her Sundering. She does it so naturally that he wonders at his blindness, at how he could not have seen it before. It is there, in the way she wrinkles her nose, in the way she nigh-on vibrates with pent-up energy, in her silences and her speech, and his chest, or the concept of his chest, squeezes tight at each thing he remembers, and he only notices belatedly that she has retrieved a comb, a brush, a hair tie, and is looking toward his snarled strands with obvious intent.

"I did. I would. I could. ...May I?"

She must have learned restraint in one of her lives, he muses, because the Azem he knows-- _knew--_ would have thrown herself at him in an exuberant embrace, squeezing until he gasped for breath, yet the one before him asks permission to return to those rites of old. He considers it a moment, but then decides: he is already half to drowning in hurts he had long forgotten, his numbness sloughing off like old serpentskin. What is one more log, added to the pyre?

"You may. On one condition."

He holds up a finger and she waits to hear his verdict, hopeful, so hopeful.

"You must tell me everything. Hold nothing back. I will know if you lie."

She nods, and so swears, and so he allows her behind him as she takes up the brush. She cradles the back of his head as she works in careful strokes, taking up the comb to pick through snarls and knots without undue pain. Her hands are gentle, her touch at once familiar and foreign, and it burns through him, such that he cannot know if it is poison or poison's-bane, if aught but ash will be left in her wake. 

Yes. This, he remembers.

Azem, and how she shone, and how he wished desperately with the folly of his youth for her to shine upon _him,_ though she was not his, was never his to possess. 

He remembers his fruitless yearning, how he took her every kindness to him, her fond partiality for him, and spun it into more, knowing he deluded himself all the while.

He remembers an intimacy never shared, how he reserved his aether, never mingling with another's in that most sacred and, yes, sensual of ways, foolishly 'saving' the experience for the day she would surely, surely look his way and see more than an untried youth in the robes of a position he had yet to grow into, and how in the end, Zodiark, the god they made, had that privilege of him instead.

He remembers her betrayal, how she abandoned them, left _him_ when he needed her most, when he longed for nothing but her arms around him to bolster him before his ~~ascension~~ _sacrifice_ ~~abnegation.~~

But as she speaks, and brushes his hair until it gleams, her words give him back, too, her reasons.

Her return.

That she resigned from her post in protest of their plan, yes, but also because she, in time of greatest crisis, begged to leave once more to find the source of the Sound and stop it... leave she was denied, by majority rule.

That she returned to Amaurot in the Final Days, out of time, only to discover one 'god' was become two, and that she threw herself against Venat's selfishness. That she tried to halt the summoning. Tried, and failed. That, thus wounded, she stumbled home to warn them, only to witness the death of their star, the Sundering that split all creation. To die in their arms, her powers spent, unable to hold herself together, with a vow to find them again. To make this right.

Her fingers begin to braid, slow, gentle, methodical, and he listens as she explains the cosmic, cruel irony of her latest life.

Hydaelyn, using her. Tempering her. Again. Again. Setting her against the Convocation as a battering ram, a weapon, a bloodied sword and gore-drenched shield, and that she, Sundered she, had their blood upon her hands.

He listens as she confesses her sins against them, as her fingertips tremble against his scalp, as her voice breaks, as she sobs. Condemns herself for a murderer, though those she ended are yet here, by some miracle.

She tells all. Every so-called triumph, every failure, every lesson learned too late. She speaks of Lahabrea, of Nabriales, of himself, of Emet-Selch, of 'Artemis and Gaia', before correcting herself to use their titles. Of how even after she learned the truth, her Mother set her against them, and she could not brook peace.

How, in the end, a lesser primal sent her back, hurtling through spacetime to land at his feet.

She finishes his braid, but her touch lingers, winding his plaited hair around her palm.

She speaks until her voice is raw, until all she has left is dry weeping, shoulders shaking. Awaiting his condemnation, perhaps, he thinks. Awaiting judgment. For her crimes.

He turns, and she stills, a bleak acceptance in her gaze.

In the end, it is that lovelorn youth still within him who finds the words he lacks, who prompts him to remove his mask, barefaced before her, and tells her,  
  
"It is not my role to speak for the Convocation. So I speak only for myself. But that you did well in fulfilling your vow, in returning to us... that cannot be denied. And so, though it is not my place, if it _were_... I would bid you welcome home, Azem."

And _here_ is the Traveler he recalls, because at that, she breaks, flinging herself into his arms, unmindful of the sharp points of his garments, and clings to him with a muffled 'thank you'. And, well, what else can he do, but hold her in return?

So he does.

Until a throat clears pointedly above him, and he announces serenely, with a sense of having got one over on the bastard for once (and more than a little misplaced pride in the doing),  
"Ah. The most honorable Emet-Selch has arrived. I do believe he wants a moment of your time."


	6. Chapter 6

At first, there is nothing but shock.

Shock, and then the blinding fury sets in, so bright and all-encompassing that he ruins the first clone body he inhabits in his haste, cutting it to shreds as he bursts from the storage tank in his righteous anger, forcing him to start over. He tries to calm himself, to take his time, to _think._

He fails.

How _dare_ she? How _dare_ this imposter summon up the spectre of his lost love, how _dare_ she claim the use of that name, how _dare_ she speak of things she _cannot_ possibly know?

For the alternative is too much to consider. Were she _not_ an imposter... for Azem to have returned to his side after the countless, unending ages--it is too much to bear, the damnable hope attempting to bloom in his breast though he knows it to be folly.

She cannot be. This _cannot_ be. That she is gone, that she is lost to him, lost to them all, is the knowledge that forces him to press on, to make their world anew. That she _left_ him, the spite curdling him to sour bitterness, that he will press on despite her folly. All his strength and all his surety, wrapped in thorns and sorrow, would surely crumble before her, come again in contrition, begging his forgiveness, his clemency... begging, as she _had,_ to come _home._

Home.

As if there could ever be a home, without her.

And so he stands before this mummer's farce in all his fury, and demands she account for her sins.

"Give me one reason why I should not strike you down where you stand, little _hero_ ," he spits, and there is acid on his tongue and in his heart.

And for her part, the words are all spent. It is clear from her reddened eyes and wet cheeks that she has been sobbing, and her voice is hoarse from all her spilled confesssions. Elidibus, fool that he is and always was for Azem, has been playing house with her in his absence, it seems, his hair in a braid Emet-Selch has not seen for nigh-on ten _thousand_ years, and his mood sours all the more. He has half a mind to demand an accounting from his Unsundered brother-in-arms, to dress him down like the child he was, so long ago. But no.

The mortal will answer, or he will end her sorry existence _and_ this affront to his dignity right now.

He knows and cares not how she came by the information she used against him, nor how she learned of Azem's sigil of office. What he demands as proof, she will lack, she _must_ lack.

And then she says,

"In the future I come from...before we fought...before I _killed_ you--" she shudders and holds herself, an agony so raw and real on her face that she must be the world's best thespian to pull it off, and he is, begrudgingly, impressed with the lengths to which she will go to save her sorry skin, even as he is incensed by the deceit. "--you bade Hythlodaeus's shade give me this. So I could remember...that we once lived."

She reaches into her clothing, a hidden pocket next to her heart, and draws out a small golden stone he would recognize anywhere, in any lifetime. A surge of alarm, irrational, shoots through him--had she somehow picked his pocket? But no. He retrieves her soul stone from its place with him, where it has resided since he had it made in secret in the final days of their world.

So how can she possibly have it? A forgery, it must be, he thinks, until she proffers it to him in an open palm.

He wraps gloved fingers around it and is instantly struck by the energy, identical to the stone he possesses, that is and was so quintessentially Azem. All of her, he had poured into it, laboring at night away from the rest of the Convocation, never breathing a word to a soul lest they tell him to stop. The shock on Elidibus's face is naked and plain, and their Emissary breathes out,

"Is that--? Did you make... Emet-Selch, you _didn't--"_

There is no falsifying this, this aetherial signature. He should know. He created the damn thing. It _is,_ somehow, the selfsame soul stone that he holds in his other hand. There could be no other.

Her tale, then, _must_ be true. In the future, he gave...would give...this to her. Which meant--would mean--that her _soul..._ He looks, with eyes unclouded, and he _sees_. She is not whole; how could she be? But that color, that he would know from a million others--it suffuses this woman, every crevice, warring with the so-called 'blessing' of Hydaelyn that sits atop her, scum on the clear lake of her aether.

"What has She done to you?"

His voice is choked, hollow, not his own.

But if this is Azem, and Azem is mortal, and _Hydaelyn_ has Her bloody claws in her...

"We have to fix this. We have to get Her out of you. Elidibus, you'll assist me. We'll raise you back to your position. Lahabrea will fuss that he wasn't consulted, but he'll get over it. You're...you're _back._ You came _home._ "

He's going to shake right out of his skin. There's so much to do! She's so fragile! They'll have to be so careful. But then...but then...

"If you'll have me."

"If I'll-! Elidibus," he barks. The other man's lips are twitching. 

"Yes, Emet-Selch?"

"Hit her."

"I beg your pardon?"

"Well, I can't do it! It's _Azem!"_

"And what makes you think ~I~ would want to discipline Azem for you?"

"On second thought, don't hit her. She's Sundered now, a godsforsaken _sneeze_ might kill her. Oh, this won't do, this won't do at _all_ -"

"Hades?"

"Yes, my love?"

"Come here and hold me, you neurotic mess of a man."

Oh. Yes.

That, he can do.


End file.
